‘Oh, do you?  From Clara herself?’

’Yes.  Don’t talk to me about her!  There!  I’m sick an tired of her—­ an’ so are you, I should think, if you’ve any sense left.  Her an’ me can’t get along, an’ that’s the truth.  Why, when I met her on Sunday afternoon, she was that patronisin’ you’d have thought she’d got a place in Windsor Castle.  Would she come an’ have a cup of tea?  Oh dear, no!  Hadn’t time!  The Princess of Wales, I suppose, was waitin’ round the corner!’

Having so relieved her mind, Mrs. Byass laughed with a genuine gaiety which proved how little malice there was in her satire.  Sidney could not refuse a smile, but it was a gloomy one.

’I’m not sure you’ve done all you might have to keep her friends with you,’ he said seriously, but with a good-natured look.

‘There you go!’ exclaimed Mrs. Byass, throwing back her head.  ’Of course everybody must be in fault sooner than her!  She’s an angel is Miss Hewett!  Poor dear! to think how shameful she’s been used!  Now I do wonder how you’ve the face to say such things, Mr. Kirkwood!  Why, there’s nobody else livin’ would have been as patient with her as I always was.  I’m not bad-tempered, I will say that for myself, an’ I’ve put up with all sorts of things (me, a married woman), when anyone else would have boxed her ears an, told her she was a conceited minx.  I used to be fond of Clara; you know I did.  But she’s got beyond all bearin’; and if you wasn’t just as foolish as men always are, you’d see her in her true colours.  Do shake yourself a bit, do!  Oh, you silly, silly man!’

Again she burst into ringing laughter, throwing herself backwards and forwards, and at last covering her face with her hands.  Sidney looked annoyed, but the contagion of such spontaneous merriment in the end brought another smile to his face.  He moved his head in sign of giving up the argument, and, as soon as there was silence, turned to the object of his visit.

’I see you’ve still got the card in the window.  I shouldn’t wonder if I could find you a lodger for those top-rooms.’

‘And who’s that?  No children, mind.’

Sidney told her what he could of the old man.  Of Jane he only said that she had hitherto lived with the Hewetts’ landlady, and was now going to be removed by her grandfather, having just got through an illness.  Dire visions of infection at once assailed Mrs. Byass; impossible to admit under the same roof with her baby a person who had just been ill.  This scruple was, however, overcome; the two rooms at the top of the house—­unfurnished—­had been long vacant, owing to fastidiousness in Mr. and Mrs. Byass, since their last lodger, after a fortnight of continuous drunkenness, broke the windows, ripped the paper off the walls, and ended by trying to set fire to the house.  Sidney was intrusted with an outline treaty, to be communicated to Mr. Snowdon.